Grandfather
by bigowlenergy
Summary: Natsume Reiko watches the world through a cat's eyes. In which Reiko lives, though she is unrecognized. For natsuyuubigbang2k19


Natsume Reiko watches the world through a cat's eyes.

The trees grow under her glare in fast motion; snow rises and falls like quick breaths as the seasons speed by. Reiko chafes at the confinement, yet feels nothing for it beyond a dull listlessness. Time means nothing to her, now.

There are years passing out there, for the humans, for the exorcists, and when she gets out of this unlucky statue, the ones who bothered her once upon a time will be dead and gone as humans normally do. As Reiko should have done. As, to the world outside, Reiko _did_. There is no grieving family for Natsume Reiko - the ghost, the unwanted child, the interfering human with too much power - the beast. Her name, her power, her legacy, will all be forgotten to time, and she will be free to do as she pleases.

_Finally_.

Reiko meets the challenge of being sealed with all the apathy and acceptance of being transformed into a _yokai_, and waits it out.

And waits. _And waits._

Rain falls and summers pass. Occasionally, life-speed motion jolts her into focus for a few brief seconds - a butterfly scuttles through the small clearing, an excited child rushes past, a wondering_ yokai_ happens by. A tree falls, with sound. Festival lights fill the sky - thunder fills the sky - the sky falls down on her small roof in tinkling droplets. It happens, then it is gone just the same.

There is only time - there is _only_ time - to either think deeply or to lose all faculty inside a seal, so Reiko thinks. Newly freed _yokai_ who have lost all but their rage from the isolation have roamed the forest, attracted exorcists, been her opponents - _before_ \- Reiko knows that she is nothing short of a time bomb in this situation, and she doesn't want that for herself. At the same time, Reiko's human life has been one long waiting room - from one home to the next, from one forest to the other. One fight to the next. She's used to this type of solitude. But still, she amuses herself with plans of what to do when she's freed, and gathers her considerable power as it regenerates.

Here is what Reiko will do, in short order:

First, she will fly to Yatsuhara and dive tackle that horse bastard out of her green pasture, as a forceful reminder not to get cocky and think her capable of defeat. Stretch her long sedimentary form in flight and fight and get her barrings back in order. Then, she'll go drinking with her group to celebrate her return - they'll love an excuse to hold a feast, and the very idea of getting some of those blessing imbued flower wines after all this time makes her power surge in glee. After a solid week or so of reunion parties, she'll take on her human form and go to town, see if there are any better bars open, if Nanasuji is still in business, maybe find a few cute human girls to chat up. Then, _then_, she'll swing back to her meadow and just chill for a while. As long as she wants. Where ever she wants.

That's what she wants to do.

That's what she _wants _to be thinking about.

Instead, the ominous pressure of the Book of Friends is still lingering insistently in her being, moving about in the world outside in strange fits and starts that never fail to capture her attention like a needle being dragged over her skin. A dowsing rod made of pure, untenable power and fettered with instinctual fear. The power of it remains untouched, but the threat of that particular little record of hers being used - that _thing _she made on such childish impulses, without any understanding of the consequences - that problem is loose in the world without her supervision, without any good reason to even exist. A product of nothing but a selfish, brokenhearted human who couldn't admit the truth, even to herself.

_That Book - a solid green cover and the thickest paper Reiko could buy, since it was too easy to crumple up thin sheets or tear up pagebooks - a silly game for a name, for trust, for the wholeness of a person - a gorgeous, verdant field of blue, perfect in its isolation and beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, but - even more wonderful were the blue eyes of the human woman who stood in it, years and years and years later, leaning on a crutch, too weak to walk, too weak to see Reiko. Reiko's stupid heart too weak to leave until she moved on, under a spring sun, under the rushing shadows of a familiar forest, above and below and between a field of blue, blue, blue -_

_"Aren't you lonely, like this? Reiko?" That shaggy spirit - _Soranome its name is Soranome_, this knowledge is embedded in Reiko's head now, she is a font of names, these days - and isn't that just too much - isn't that - _

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko! _

The Book is a very real threat, with or without her there to guard it.

It keeps Reiko on edge, not infuriated, but calculating. Trying to prepare for the worst. Caged and circling, gritting her incorporeal teeth-that-are-not-teeth, hidden inside the seal. _Waiting._

There's no way the exorcists got a hold of it; those type of humans would be using it to death, leaving destruction in their wake. She'd feel that, even from here. She'd be seeing the effects of it, as spirits were torn out of the forest from before her very eyes. As the life was torn out of the forest, until only barren trees and dull grass remained.

Or they'd burn it. Reiko would certainly feel that, too, just - not for long.

It also isn't hidden. A hidden thing would not be moving around like this. Probably? Maybe it's to keep it from being found… the machinations of humans have always been a mystery to Reiko.

Regardless, that very real threat keeps Reiko aware, keeps her from succumbing to the isolation. Shocks her awake again and again, a fear rooted deep in her _yokai_ form being tugged into her forebrain whenever it is touched.

For many years, nothing happens. A few wayward humans find her, but none set her free. Some leave offerings that piss her off with watching them slowly rot away right in front of her. A spirit or two stumbles upon her and gets scared off by her suppressed aura and the threat of exorcism.

Exorcism is always a threat - even to human beings, apparently.

And then one day, a heavy breeze blows past, carrying the scent of_ ayakashi_ rage and human flesh.

_Ha,_ thinks Reiko absently, in the middle of counting the leaves of the tree directly above her, mesmerized by the play of light in shadow, _get 'em._

Her senses have been heightened by her constant alertness, so she hears it - a confrontation in the forest. Running. A fight. A sharp surge of human spiritual power. A pained cry. More running.

And somewhere in the middle, her true name had been uttered.

A human comes fleeing out of the bushes and snaps her seal with a rush of unfettered power so fierce it breaks the very rope binding her. That thing had been reinforced with so much power that it stood up to hurricane force winds, to her battering it from the inside nonstop for _decades_. But it snapped without so much as a sound around a painfully thin ankle, giving way to a burst of power that washes over Reiko like nostalgia.

There's a long, strange moment where Reiko is aware she can _move_, can escape, but the long stretch of sedimentary existence has left her confused about _how _to do so. The human scrambles to reattach the bindings, and to Reiko's horror she can sense that the clumsy knot and honest, desperate belief would actually _work_. Before those frightened hands can finish tying her down again, she invokes her favorite play against obnoxious interlopers: fear.

**THE SEAL HAS BEEN BROKEN **

"_No it hasn't!_" The human cries, frantically retying the rope.

Reiko presses her whole self foreword, out of the seal as quickly as she can, anchoring onto whatever she can get a hold of in her mad scramble to get out out _out_.

And, as she had grown to accept with a fair measure of annoyance, the physical form of the seal is embedded in her power, leaving her a small, nonthreatening cat of a beast. She's been sealed in it longer than she was a _yokai _otherwise, so it was inevitable. Still though, _damn_, she really likes her awesome true form.

The human - is so weirdly familiar that it confuses her further. Sets her off kilter just enough to bother her. They don't react like a human should to her incredible form, even when it looks like this. There's too much power leaking from this kid for them not to be seeing her - this is - a young human, looking back at her with too much confusion and not enough natural fear, clutching a rope seal in the spring green of a sacred forest.

Something about those eyes catches her off guard.

"My," She begins honestly impressed but equally miffed - what kind of _welcome back_ is this? Not nearly enough fanfare for the likes of Reiko, personally."A human sees a powerful spirit and isn't afraid. How brave of you, kid."

The human child hesitates, still just looking straight at her without fear, without even enough confusion, but at least manages an answer.

"...I'm used to it? Are you an _ayakashi_?"

"Hmph," Reiko answers, because she's not quite on solid footing here either, "Don't lump me in with those weak creatures."

And with that, finally fully free and out of the seal and back, back to herself, Reiko gets a good look at them. At that face. Those fearless, golden eyes.

Those stupid spirits prowling around the trees had called this brat by _her name_, had invoked her at the sight of them because -

_That is her face. _

That, cemented in human flesh and human power and very, very real, is Natsume Reiko's face.

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko! _

"_You aren't Natsume Reiko_," She begins, just starting to come into a righteous rage over the misuse of her _true name_, of her _own face_, but -

Now that she can look them over properly, there are probably a few differences - it's getting hard to remember what she used to look like, in full. The form she'd been changed in is imprinted on her mind, yes, but it has a dreamlike quality that prevents her from seeing it clearly on her own. This human has much shorter hair and much uglier clothes, however.

This human, young, powerful, and foolish in a particularly inelegant metaphor about her past behavior, is _wearing her face_. Her face, her human fearlessness, her power, in her forest - but it is the truth. This is no face burglar or punishing phantasm - this is a human boy waltzing around Yatsuhara like it can't kill him and attracting the attention of weak local _yokai_.

He also smells _mostly_ human, and alarmingly, a lot like herself.

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko! _

The gathering confusion and wariness turns quickly to surprise on his distressingly familiar face - in direct contrast to Reiko, who feels the same, but isn't too sure how cats make faces yet.

"That's my grandmother's name?" He offers weakly.

Natsume Reiko's rapidly changed and changing world grinds to a quick and sudden halt.

"_Your grandmother?!_" She shrieks before she can stop herself. The mental gymnastics she has to preform to make that fit in with - with her own existence is just_ too much_ for her right now -

"...Did you know her?" Oh, of course she would be unrecognizable in this form, and thank the great beasts for that. Not that this kid - several generations removed from the last humans to see her - would recognize her so easily, either. None of this is a conversation she'll ever be ready for, honestly. And it's just not possible, right? Right?

Right?

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko!_

But that's her face, and those are her eyes, looking at her with something like hope in them. Reiko reigns it all in and tucks it all away for a deep examination later - hopefully with the help of a solid bottle of _sake _\- and takes the opportunity presented before her for what it is.

If this is real - and it feels too true to be a trick - then she can at least give this kid a push away from her own follies. Maybe fix a few things. And then run for it before her fate here is sealed in whatever massive way she can practically sense coming for her with all the force of a swung bat.

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko!_

"...Natsume Reiko was a beautiful human. She lived around here, somewhere. She could see spirits, so she often got into it with them." The kid - her grandson? - looks like he might interrupt, so she barrels on, trying to impress the lesson she learned too late into him. "But no human ever understood her. She was always alone." Looking deep into those quiet, burdened eyes, she presses harder, making sure he understands, although she gets the sinking feeling that he already does - "She was always, always alone. So she turned to spirits instead."

But now the kid - _her grandson_ \- just looks sad and reflective, and also - it meant something, to be directly -related- to _her_, specifically. Reiko can get to the end of this mystery later, there really is a more pressing issue here. It's tugging at her, away from the forest, away from this ridiculous situation, somewhere to the East.

**_THAT BOOK_**

_A deep, resonate voice echoes around the thin clearing, accompanied by the sweet chime of bells and wet croaking from the flood of tiny green frogs beneath Reiko's bare feet. _

_**I SHOULD CHALLENGE YOU FOR IT, NATSUME REIKO**_

_Reiko stands firm against the sudden rush of powerful wind, against the tide of frogs, and readies herself for one last game. It's got to be some truly horrible taboo, for her to be doing this as a spirit herself, but fuck if she has any idea of what else to do. With herself. With her life. Her power. _

_One last name. Then she'll change her ways. _

_Right? _

"Do… you know the whereabouts of the Book of Friends?"

The confusion on the kid's transparent face is all too genuine, and damn if that isn't a disorientating sight. The low levels who have been combing the forest finally get closer, rustling around in the bushes behind them, silencing whatever objections the human - _her grandson_ \- was about to start spouting.

"The barrier here will block them, since they're so weak." Reiko offers. And then the fearless idiot - definitely _her _grandson - turns his back to her with a _thanks _and not so much as an ounce of self preservation.

Reiko pounces, getting directly into his aura to snatch up a better idea of his power level, and then takes off in the direction that the Book of Friends is pulling her.

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko! _Echoes and echoes and echoes in her head, like long forgotten laughter.

She shifts into her true form, and flies away.

* * *

_It takes years to hone her power to manageable levels after her metamorphosis. _

_Those first few weeks were, in a word, insane. Attempting to reconcile the naturally cleansing, exorcism-based nature of her intense power as a human with the physical - metaphysical? - form of a yokai resulted in something wholly unsustainable. Reiko's _aramitama_ was something to be feared, since it had all poured out of a human spirit that had been well drenched in something like bitterness, something like avarice, for a too-short life time._

_Had Reiko died, then? She's still unsure._

_Once the dust settles - once Reiko learns to settle - she masters the art of appearing human. Of being able to be perceived by humans._

_It's easier, somehow, to want to be among them, now that she no longer needs them. When it wasn't the threat of rejection by humans, but the fact of it, then instead of a careful navigation of dangerous and depressing waters, Reiko can actually do something like cope. Interact. Explore._

_Natsume Reiko can finally live freely, no strings attached. _

_Well. There is only one string, and it's wrapped firmly around the Book of Friends._

_If there are relatives she never wishes to see again then - there are - they will never see her again. If she wants to walk the forest or the streets late at night alone, then she will be alone - truly, utterly, serenely alone. If she doesn't want to see another human ever again, then she does not have to. If she wants to be human and be treated as a human, then she can be. _

_If Reiko wants to go a bar instead of avoiding it in fear of what her current housing situation might think of her as, then she is already there. _

_The only problem is that Reiko hasn't managed to steal any new clothes - or, really, been interested in stealing any - and couldn't appear in her memory-form's school uniform for obvious reasons, which left her to appear in the traditional spirit garb of a plain kimono. Not really her look, but better than anything else. She'd woken up in it. It was part of her, now._

_The second issue is that she hasn't yet figured out how to make human alcohol work for her. That is less of a real problem, since she can get absolutely blasted on spirit wine whenever she wants, and doesn't really plan to get drunk at her bar dives. _

_It's all about the people there. The humans._

_The chatter and laughter of a genuine group of humans, with no idea that an unwanted creature like Natsume Reiko lurks in their midst. _

_And if even it was known - even if she was known - Reiko has the odd, pleasant feeling that the people at this bar in particular wouldn't mind so much. _

_"Welcome back, Miss Ghost. The usual?" _

_Reiko and this bartender - Kurosaki Miki, no sight, no power, no threat, but a very pretty name - have been - playing a game. She thinks that is what that is. Not much in a way of reference otherwise. Reiko can't give her true name, and doesn't really want to give up coming here yet for some reason, so she plays it safe, in the way that humans usually hate and detest her for. This human - this young, beautiful woman with sharp little glasses and short, glossy hair had smiled at Reiko - indulgent, understanding - and had been giving her nicknames instead. _

_Reiko takes the usual. _

_People watching - human watching - becomes a monthly past time for Reiko, just watching the world pass by, the people change, the people stay the same. The same salary men sit in the corner, the same college kid slumps at the back table, the same rotation of young women and their friends flutter in and out like butterflies. _

_This week, however, is different. _

_Reiko smiles her habitual smile, a leftover platitude from so many wasted years chasing the attention and love of humans, and passes enough cash across the counter to cover her long running tab, in exact change. _

_Miki pauses in mixing Reiko's drink, staring at the messy bills for a long moment before beaming at her. Reiko relaxes finally, having been observing the way that other patrons paid for weeks before attempting it herself. She's never really been to restaurants before, after all. _

_"It's a bit unfair, you know," Miki began, pressing the drink directly into Reiko's hand and then leaning closer, folding her arms on the bar. "How can I write up a receipt for you if I don't know your name?" _

_This is - playful, Reiko thinks. A continuation of the game from earlier, or a new one, or something different altogether. But it is - good. It is good - once she tamps down the instinctual rage that flares up whenever a lowly human dares to ask her name._

_"It's alright, to be unknown, I think." She continues, startling Reiko with her own agreement. "How about I give you a name, then?" _

_Something in that strikes Reiko blind, the idea of her life coming into such a full, perfect circle, that she can do nothing but laugh. Reiko - has not laughed, not really, in a long time. It feels good - to laugh and to talk, and to be given a name. By a human. _

_"Sure," She manages finally, "But make it cool." _

_"I'll have to see if I think of anything half as cool as you," Miki answers, seeming delighted with Reiko's response. _

_Another patron calls out, rushing in out of the sudden rain, and Reiko enjoys her drink in peace. People come and go. The rain filters out. Reiko has three drinks that don't affect her. The usual. _

_It isn't until Reiko finally leaves in the early hours of the morning that she thinks to check the receipt Miki had slipped her once her shift was over. _

Tab paid in full. Call me, mysterious Madara-san.

_Reiko lets go of her human form and watches dawn break over the sleepy town from the bar's roof until the sun is well overhead. _

Reiko haunts the country side for a while, her senses too frazzled to get a decent bead on her book, a bit overwhelmed by the sudden and massive influx of sight and sound and power in the huge, green world outside of her seal. This is the general direction it lies in, but the specific coordinates are evading her.

Yatsuhara is still beautiful, still green, still lush. Misuzu is not there to get rowdy with, nor is Hinoe around to provide the good, strong _sake_. All the plans Reiko clung to have been shifted violently around. This strange future she ended up in is somehow wilder than any she could have imagined - and she imaged eating the exorcists that dared to seal her a few times. Only a few times. Experimentally.

Admitting defeat, she returns to the forest paths and follows her grandson when he reappears, still evading those two low level beasts. She would have beat them both good by now, at his age._ Are they a little familiar, actually…?_ When she squints at the larger one, its name rises to the surface of her mind - whoops. And what is his age, anyway? All humans look so young and small to her now. But she still recognizes a school uniform when she sees one, so there's that.

He leads her to a familiar house on the outskirts of what was once her favorite town, and longest positive stay among humans. Reiko flows inside through a crack and scopes it out while the old lady out front fusses over the wayward boy - and calls him _Takashi_. That name resonates with the reek of power around this house - so, so familiar, but now, in the thick of it, she can taste the subtle differences between them. It's so strong it feels like a barrier on its own, covering up the precise feeling of The Book, which is certainly here. _Somewhere_.

Thankfully, her grandson is just as naive as she assumed he would be, and immediately brings out a whole box full of nostalgic junk - _ah, Reiko really kept every little token from pretty girls like some kind of lovesick fool, didn't she? How embarrassing_ \- eventually pulling out her Book, covered in dust from disuse. That sets her at ease a little, but with the absolute carelessness and untrained power of this descendant of hers - she needs to get her Book back before this kid blows the forest to kingdom come on accident. Misuzu would do it for a laugh, let alone some of the bitter, violent minor gods in there.

Reiko has spent the last however many years - two generations worth, at least - lamenting her careless attitude and general foolishness with her own power. She will not see it continue. Her legacy of fear ends _now_.

**THAT BOOK - HAND IT OVER **

The human - her grandson - _Takashi _\- flinches and manages to evade with the ease of someone long used to random attacks by angry spirits. Reiko slams into the screen behind him, her transformation back and forth into her true self throwing her off kilter, her sealed form a more comfortable fit after so, so long trapped in it.

The crash echoes through the large house, and a human voice calls up the stairs as she frees her small self from the ruined wall

Her annoyed demand of **GIVE IT BACK **is interrupted by - honestly, exactly what she deserves.

Natsume Reiko has never been victim to one of her own punches before. Naturally, that _was_something of an impossibility, but also something that many unhappy _yokai_ had wished on her as a human.

She remembers distinctly the first time a spirit expressed a curse of that nature against her -

_It's some tiny tree spirit thing, one of those vaguely shaped suggestions of organic life with high pitched voices, not even powerful enough to bother with. It had been dropping cherries on her cousin's head and then stolen his scarf. Reiko gave it a light pounding when it turned out to be rude and mildly aggressive,. It hadn't appreciated her forceful response, despite her holding back enough to not exorcise it. She didn't even take it's name. _

_Still, with a voice like a blown reed, it had shrieked at her, drilled into her ears, pounded behind her eyes the words - _

_**May you get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko!**_

_The bare force of the words had pushed her out of the tree she'd chased it up like a strong wind, pushed the air from her lungs and scraped up her arm through her ratty school sweater when she hit the ground dazed. She'd emerged from that afternoon with the favorite scarf and a relatively mild scolding about her sweater. And, apparently, a curse. Even after her change, those words had stuck in her skull like glue. A curse. A warning. _

_Retribution._

_Once Reiko had been metamorphosed into a yokai herself, she had begun to understand the true horror that all spirits held for humans with power. Had felt her power transform as she did, into a deep well of force that dwelled in her being with an unusual coexistence. Intense human power in an unnatural vessel. The natural target of that power now contained it - Reiko was the perfect amalgamation of human predator and yokai prey, of human prey and yokai predator - mixed and poured into a mold shaped like a great beast of awesome size and strength._

_A great white beast with the name Natsume Reiko sealed across it's face like a brand, like a reminder, like the seal of her human power. _

_Then, she'd encountered the exorcists. The power they wielded, the genuine agony of seals and exorcism - the sheer hatred that rolled off them like the tide smelled like a delicious feast of emotion and a powerful force in its own right. _

Now, however, _now_ she finally, honestly understands that her punch was never a joke.

It comes from a clumsy right hook - underhand, form unsteady, thumb tucked in, nails not trimmed enough to make it a comfortable form - an instinctual reaction as explosive as hers had once been, with none of the finesse of experience or training. A sudden, desperate bid for self defense. The physical force is next to nothing, of course, up against her magnificent strength, but it's rife with a startling, cleansing power that pulses through her like a wave and intensifies at the small area of contact to the point of honest pain, like an enormous wasp sting or a grease burn. It ripples through her entire well of power like a skipped stone, interrupting her connection with it. It's disorientating, painful, a sharp dissociation from the thing she's just spent decades totally mired within, from the very basis of her own existence.

It's half an exorcism.

_Get what comes to you, Natsume Reiko! _

_Get what comes to you! _

_Get what comes to you! _

It's completely humiliating, to be laid low by her own power, come back around in a karmic circle of perfect retribution to punish her further. _Reiko's already figured it out, damnit!_ She _knows _that it was wrong of her to do that - why did the entire universe decide to be stacked against her, now? _This is stupid._

She eats her humble pie and the watermelon slices her surprise descendant offers her.

They talk about the Book of Friends, and Reiko tries to impress on the kid - and the obviously listening universe - that it is a _fundamentally cursed object of immense power that no human should ever have had at all._ The way he treats the Book, as careless and uncomprehending as she had once been, gives her anxiety and makes her sure of her choice to reclaim it. But it's strange. There's a solid finality to the way he holds it, to the sight of her own hands flipping through the pages, her own eyes looking through the names, something like a gentle pity and too clear sympathy replacing her own apathy and callousness.

…This isn't going to go the way Reiko wants it to, is it?

* * *

It doesn't.

This kid - this human - her _grandson_ \- is too nice for his own good, soft in all the places she had been abrasive, and exuding an aura of nauseatingly genuine care where she had cultivated distance.

Reiko has always known how to return the names, but it was never really about the names - or the _yokai_. Not really. Not to her. Not back then. It had been about the power, about the despairing _need_ for conversation, for connection. And then that very human need had scared her off, kept her making connections and then breaking them before they could be broken. Maybe it was about the power she couldn't wield against humans. Maybe it was all just about Reiko's heart being stronger than others.

Never has she pretended to be a good person.

It's easier to connect with humans when she doesn't have to pretend to be a person at all.

To hear her own casually destructive attitude brought to light and emphasized with is surreal. Her Book of Friends, a precious legacy? The _yokai _howling in grief and violence deserving of closure? Natsume Reiko _human, fallible, lonely_? This is a carefully cultivated hell, just for Reiko, and is, in a word, exactly what she deserves.

Ah, fate. She's going to get what comes to get her, no more, no less.

* * *

Also, her punches _hurt._

* * *

_"Your what?!"_ Hinoe manages while choking on her smoke, waving the air with none of her usual grace to clear the cloud so she can stare incredulously at Reiko.

Reiko, for her part, is clutched tight to a mostly empty _congratulations on surviving, you dumbass! sake _gift from the other _yokai_. She's genuinely touched that Hinoe managed to save such a fine vintage for Reiko's inevitable return for so long without so much as a taste. It's both an impressive feat for the alcoholic bunch in these parts and very, very welcome in this current moment.

Even if Reiko has to wrap her whole self around what she could have once held up in a single claw.

"My grandson, keep up." Reiko mumbles into the side of the bottle, rolling over in the grass, fascinated by the return of physical texture and by the pleasant wooziness her drunkenness induces in the motion.

"But - _how_?" Hinoe splutters.

Reiko has been trying to answer that question herself for quite a few hours now. She certainly hadn't given birth - although there were a few lapses in her consciousness during the sealing wherein a miracle _yokai_ born child could have manifested outside her shrine, for all she knew.

That - wasn't too likely. _Hopefully_. It wasn't the usual manner of things, at the least.

That left a few all too real options, which had Reiko wincing in guilt as she went down the line of suspects.

Well, it wasn't Hinoe. Kid was human. Or human enough, at least. Which meant -

"Reiko." Says Hinoe. Reiko rolls around her bottle to face away from the other spirit and says nothing.

"Reiko, how often were you going to those bars…?"

Reiko says nothing. It wasn't Soko. They'd never met up again. Soko couldn't see spirits, after all. By the time Reiko had figured out how to look human, so many years had passed and Soko had grown up - and Reiko hadn't.

"Reiko, please tell me you know who it was."

Reiko says nothing. There was that foreign tourist with the smooth blonde hair, which didn't fit the Reiko-copy's looks, but if her child's spouse -_oh, what a sentence_ \- had also been Japanese, then maybe…? Then there were her three favorites at the local dive, all human, all young enough to give Reiko a chance. There was her fling with that exorcist woman with the sweetly curled hair, which, yeah, that whole thing had been a bad idea from the start.

Still, wasn't being sealed a little much? Unless -

"Madara!" A voice booms from above before an enormous landing shakes the earth, rattling Reiko around her bottle. She keeps a tight hold on her hard won plastered state while exploding into her preferred form, rising up to meet the ever delighted Misuzu.

"I've heard tell that Natsume Reiko was running amok in Yatsuhara once more, yet the rumors varied. I'm glad to see you returned to us, finally."

Reiko bristles at their slightly gloating, nominally polite tone, kicking her bottle back out of the firing range for safety. If another spirit touches her first drink in two generations, she'll eat them, one bite.

But first, to begin her_ Return to Yatsuhara List_, from the top.


End file.
